Jared (31 page)

Raisa could see “well enough” between vampires and
weres still being a scary thing. “What’d he do?”

Jared shrugged and the corner of his mouth twitched.
“No one’s talking, including Jace. But figuring it’s Jace, and figuring no
one’s talking, it’s bad.”

“Jace is a troublemaker?”

Jared cut her a surprised glance. “Nah, just a wild
card. Never know what’s going to take his fancy or how far he’s going to take a
point.”

“And he made a point with Ian’s pack?” she hazarded a
guess.

“That’s our guess.”

“That couldn’t have been convenient when the Sanctuary
made its move.”

“It made things sticky up until Ian’s natural
contrariness came to the fore.”

“Ian is what you’d call another wild card?”

Another glance in her direction. “You’ve met the man,
what do you think?”

She remembered Ian’s energy. Incredibly strong and
intensely focused. She could see him taking a stand on what was important to
him and devil take the hindmost. She could also see him not involving himself
in issues that did not concern him. He was definitely an all-or-nothing man. “I
think he’d be a very bad enemy to have.”

He looked surprised.

“What?”

He shrugged. “It just sounds strange coming from you.
You’re always looking at the upside of everything.”

“That was the upside.”

“Yeah?”

“For whatever reason, Ian decided not to be your
enemy. I’d think you’d consider that a good thing.”

More shadows appeared. No longer hiding, wolves ran
alongside the SUV, pacing it easily. Their mouths half open in grins that
showed very big, very sharp teeth. Rai cast them a wary glance. “You’re sure
they’re on our side?”

Jared smiled. “Positive.” He lifted his hand in a
casual wave. The largest wolf, with amber fur and light-colored eyes, tilted
its head back and barked before veering off to the right.

“And you’re right. We were lucky Ian landed on our
side of this conflict. Though he could have made the decision a bit sooner than
he did.”

“When did he make it?”

“When we were knee-deep in Sanctuary warriors and
losing badly.”

“That would seem like perfect timing to me.”

His “It would” was dry.

The SUV hit a rut, about the hundredth in the short
drive up the road, bouncing her around and snapping her teeth together.

“Uh-huh.”

She dug the fingernails of her left hand into the seat
and grabbed the hand bar above the window harder. “Are you testing the
suspension of this vehicle on purpose?”

His eyes cut to her white-knuckled grip on the seat.
“Sorry.” He eased off the accelerator. “Just in a hurry to get home.”

Home. The word jerked her attention away from the
wolves. It suddenly dawned on her that Jared wasn’t just taking her to another
compound, he was taking her to his home. Where his family and friends lived. Oh
shoot. She licked her lips with her suddenly dry tongue. In her day a man only
brought a woman home to his family for one reason. Of course, it was no longer
her day. And maybe things had changed, but she eyed Jared from under her
lashes. This could get sticky.

“What are you going to tell them about me?”

“The truth.”

The truth could be umpteen different things, depending
from which angle a person looked at it. “And what would that be?”

His energy stroked over hers with the softness of a
touch. “That you’re my wife.”

“That’s not the truth.”

“It is, if I say it is.”

“You can’t just declare me your wife.”

His eyebrow went up. “Sweetheart, when it comes to
pretty little vamps like you, I can do whatever I want, and you know it.
Bonding choice is in the hands of the male.”

She did. Vampire society was very much a
might-makes-right world. Chauvinistic in the extreme. Which was why she’d
stayed away from all the male vampires that she possibly could. “And you want
to bond with me? Permanently?” She hadn’t expected that. There were levels to
vampire mating, from very light to the permanent bonding that came from
marking. She and Jared were playing somewhere in the middle.

“That’s a done deed.”

Or so she’d thought. Her heart hung up in her throat,
and she asked, “Since when?”

“Since the first time we made love.” His hand came to
her neck, his fingers slipping beneath the stretchy collar to touch the spot
where her shoulder and neck joined. It pulsed at his touch, heated. “But I made
it permanent yesterday.”

He’d marked her. She slapped his hand aside. “You
didn’t.” She explored the spot with her fingers, felt the increased heat. “What
did you do?” Dear God, what had he done?

She tipped the visor down and flipped open the mirror.
Pulling the neck of the shirt away, she looked. Energy—bright and pure—tinted
red at the edges, radiated off the spot. Oh damn, he’d marked her. She gasped
and wheeled on him, only to find him waiting for her. His hand curved around
her head and pulled her toward him as he kept one eye on the road.

“You’re mine, baby, from now until hell freezes over
and we cock up our toes.”

She braced her hands on his side. Her muscles were no
match for his. She went where he wanted, sliding across the bench seat until
her hip met his and her shoulder notched under his. “You had no right.”

His lips brushed hers. “I had every right.”

She shook her head, ignoring the warmth of his mouth,
his pull on her senses. He’d taken her choice away. Risked everything. “You
ruined everything.”

He shook his head and let her go. “I put it right.”

She sat back in her seat, reeling with the
ramifications of what this meant. She put her hand back over the spot. “I don’t
understand, how could I not know?”

“I expect you were a bit distracted at the time.”

She wanted to slap him for the satisfied smile on his
lips. Not that it would do any good. He’d gotten what he wanted. A claim on her
that all other males would recognize. That the Sanctuary would recognize. He’d
marked her, branded her. Imprisoned her. Sitting back in her seat, the anger started,
building deep inside, gathering strength as it rose. He had no right. “Well,
I’m not distracted now.”

“What does that mean?”

“I’m not accepting your claim.”

She was the most illogical woman he’d ever met, Jared
decided. She sat beside him, chin up, resolutely staring out the windshield,
arms folded across her chest in a declaration of war. A war she couldn’t hope
to win. Immortal law was pretty cut and dried when it came to marked matings.
They were permanent without revocation, the bond deeper than law.

“For a woman who claims to have embraced the vampire
life, you sure are picking and choosing the laws which you intend to follow.”

“Well, getting married is something I always intended
to have a say in.”

“Is that why you ended up working in a saloon?”

“One has nothing to do with the other.”

“Whoring sure would have cut down on your marriage
options.”

“The same way my suspected connections to the
Sanctuary have ruined my marriage options as a vampire?”

The retort stung. “You act like you didn’t want it.”

“I didn’t!”

“Bullshit.” He wrestled the vehicle back on the path
as it lurched over a rock. “You were with me all the way.”

“In the sex, yes, but I don’t remember your asking me
if I wanted to spend eternity with you.”

That was so much bull. “You agreed to be mine.”

There was a pause and then, very deliberately, she
clarified, “During climax only.”

During climax only, his ass. “Right.”

Ahead, the rock wall illusion loomed. The SUV barreled
toward it. Beside him, Raisa gasped. Her hand tightened on the seat, nails
denting the leather. At least she had the sense to be afraid of something.
Jared stepped on the accelerator. Her grip transferred to his thigh. The edge
of her talons pricked his skin through his jeans. She didn’t, however, say a
word. She just stared at that mass of rock coming up fast, and breathed through
her nose, slowly and steadily, clinging to him in her fear. Suddenly he felt
like the ass she’d all but accused him of being. “It’s an illusion.”

Her grip on his leg didn’t ease. “Then, it’s a very
good one.”

“Thank you.”

She was still staring straight ahead, but he could
feel her energy stretching out, encompassing the illusion, finding the trap.

“Don’t.”

She stopped probing immediately. “What would have
happened if I’d continued?”

“You would have blown us both up.”

“Nice touch.”

“Thank you.” He unlocked the trap, not hiding the
secret from her curious mind. She followed his moves easily through the
multilevel process, excitement building as he got to the last level,
anticipating the correct move before he made it, barely holding herself back
from doing it before him.

It was a strange experience, having someone so tuned
in to him. Surprisingly, not unwelcome. In many ways, right. The illusion
shimmered but held. The SUV shot through. He repaired the protective illusion
and pulled his SUV to a halt. “Did those Sanctuary fools really think you were
a featherhead?”

Her attention was still on the illusion. “Yes.”

“They were idiots.”

She shrugged. “They were men.”

Apparently his entire gender was in hot water at the
moment. Jared rubbed his hand over the back of his neck. She was pretty, even
in profile, the slight tilt of her nose over those full lips giving her a
tousled pixie look, the point of her jaw emphasizing that she wasn’t anyone’s
idea of easy. “Rai?”

She did look at him then, those chocolate brown eyes
flat with anger. “There’s nothing to say.”

“Not even, I’m sorry?”

“Are you?”

“I’m sorry you didn’t realize what was happening.”

She turned in the seat, her knee drawing up and to the
side in a purely feminine pose that complimented her beauty. Everything about
her was lushly, perfectly feminine, from the cream of her skin to the silky
beauty of her hair. And it just continued on down to the depth of her soft
heart. “Tell me something. If you had to do it over again, knowing you’d find
me in Ian’s office, would you?”

She wanted him to tell her yes. She was waiting for
him to tell her yes. He could feel how much. “That’s not what happened.”

“But, if it had happened that way?”

Her gaze searched his, no doubt searching for
something to hold on to. He didn’t have a damn thing to give her. Not before
he’d turned vampire and certainly not after. “It didn’t, and I’m not going to
speculate on otherwise.”

“Then tell me, why did you do it?”

“Because I wanted you.” Because his vampire had been
in control. Because he hadn’t been able to stop himself.

“And that made it all right?”

Anger and disappointment edged the question that he
was pretty sure was rhetorical. Jared hooked his hand behind her head and
dragged her forward, planting a hard kiss on her lips before she could protest.

“No, it doesn’t, but it’s done and there’s no changing
it, so we both have to accept it.”

Her fingers touched her lips. And then her tongue.
“How do you know?”

He couldn’t take his eyes off the lazy movement of her
pink tongue over her full lower lip. “Know what?”

“Know there’s no changing it?”

“No one ever has.”

The way her eyes narrowed as she said, “There’s a
first time for everything,” did not give him a warm fuzzy.

AS soon as the SUV pulled into the yard, the front
door to the house opened. Allie, his brother’s wife, came running onto the
porch, her long brown hair flaring in the breeze, the smile on her face as
broad as her belly, which was about eight months gone with child.

Jared swore and threw open the door. If she hit the
stairs at that speed, she’d go headfirst down them. He needn’t have worried.
Caleb was hot on the heels of his impulsive wife, and if he hadn’t been, the
two weres on guard duty were at the top step before she reached it.

Jared relaxed against the door. Caleb’s expression was
grim as he slipped his arm around Allie’s waist and caught her hand in his. The
weres’ faces were just as grim as she took the first step. Allie’s “Good grief,
you’d think pregnancy had snatched my brain cells bald. I do know how to go up
and down stairs” carried to him clearly.

“Jared?”

Jared leaned down and looked into the interior of the
SUV. Raisa stared at Allie, her shock evident. “That woman’s a vampire.”

“Yes.” Jared closed his door and came around to
Raisa’s side, opening the door. She was sitting in the seat staring at Allie as
if she were the eighth wonder of the world. Which to the vampires, she was. The
few who knew about her condition, that is. Raisa took his hand, letting him
help her out of the vehicle, still staring at Allie.